


Iliad

by wolftrapvirginia



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-24
Updated: 2016-06-24
Packaged: 2018-07-16 22:54:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7287946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolftrapvirginia/pseuds/wolftrapvirginia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>philos - a friend; someone dearly loved (prized) in a personal, intimate way; a trusted confidant, held dear in a close bond of personal affection.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Iliad

It happens so quickly and Nate is so pumped up on adrenaline that he doesn’t notice until much later, when Bravo Two are safely away from the bridge. 

Doc Bryan is at his side when he notices the bloody tear in the LT’s pants, right above the knee. A thin stripe sliced through the thick fabric of their newly-issued desert fatigues, exposing his wound.

It’s only a small piece of shrapnel, the pain barely-there. Must've hit him while he was running between the stuck Humvees, attempting to get his platoon out of the jam.

 

“My leg’s fine,” Nate insists dismissively as they make their way back into the night. He’s too preoccupied with keeping his men safe from further idiotic ideas from the command to focus on personal pains and strains. 

 

Later Doc Bryan takes the piece out, puts a bandage on the skin and orders him to get some sleep:

 

“I’m fine, I—“

 

“You haven’t slept in, what, thirty-six hours? If you don’t rest, you’re more likely to develop an infection, Lieutenant,” Doc says coldly. “Think that will help anyone?”

 

Nate looks at him, then at Colbert, who is standing right there, eyeing their exchange and Nate’s barely-there, essentially nonexistent, wound. 

 

“Sir,” Colbert says firmly, in a voice that implies he isn’t interested in arguing. And Nate nods, defeated. He reluctantly gives Gunny the comms, before following Colbert to the freshly dug grave.

 

_***_

 

“You know,” Nate rasps, periodically closing his eyes from exhaustion and then reopening them to peer up at Brad, “Achilles dreamed of conquering Troy alone with Patroclus.” In truth, it has been well over thirty-six hours but all he can remember is the assault on the bridge and the flashing thought of getting to Brad’s Humvee. _Must not let anything happen to him, must not let anything happen…._

 

Brad checks the bandage on LT’s leg through the tear in his pants, before carefully setting the leg atop a warm woobie. 

 

He doesn’t dwell on his answer, it’s out before he even blinks, the usual back-and-forth motif of their conversations as familiar and uninhibited as breathing. “So nice to see that Ivy League education is not going to waste even in the grimiest of wastelands, Sir.” 

 

Nate smiles warmly, his eyes bottomless in the faint light, but then continues, his voice as steady as it is over the comms, even in the worst of assaults. “And after Patroclus’ death Achilles goes from a strong, unbreakable warrior to someone who fasts and smears himself with ash off Patroclus’ dead body. And when he returns to battle he slaughters so many, fills the river so full of bodies that the waters overflow and almost drown him.”

 

Brad exhales before allowing himself to steal another look at the LT. Their eyes meet, distant sounds of explosions and radio chatter the only soundtrack to the thick-aired scene, but for some indiscernible reason, Brad feels lighter than when he’s doing over 120 on his bike. His head is empty like a bullet shell. 

 

If he doesn’t resist this lightness he may float up into the dry Iraqi air. 

 

“Should I go fetch that LSA, Sir? Sounds like it would come in handy with all the phantasmagorical homoeroticism of ancient mythology.” Brad smirks and watches with pure stomach-knotting pleasure as LT’s eyes flash at him, greener than San Franciscan grass after heavy rain and deadlier than an F-18 airstrike. 

 

“While the exact nature of their relationship has been a topic for debate for centuries,” Nate admits, “It is considered by many that Patroclus was to Achilles both a hetaîros -- a fellow soldier, and a  _philos --_ a friend or a lover _._ ”

 

“Get some sleep, Sir. And maybe tomorrow you and I can drive into Baghdad all by our lonesome.” Brad lowers his eyes, unable to stop himself from staring at the uneven tear in Nate’s pants, a thin strip of pale skin peeking through, barely visible and yet so obviously, so tantalizingly _there_.

 

“Brad,” Nate says so quietly it can barely be heard through the wind. 

 

Brad looks back at him and takes in the view: eyes finally closed, dark shadows of eyelashes falling over the cheeks, patches of dirt on pale skin, tired lines around his mouth and forehead. He looks so young and yet so burdened. “Sir?”

 

“Have Gunny wake me in thirty mikes,” Nate murmurs. 

 

Brad doesn’t move an inch for the next hour, guarding the LT’s sleep.


End file.
